The intent of this section is to provide the reader with an overview of authentication,
not a step-by-step march through all the logic and supporting materials
that we have developed and uncovered in this ongoing and authentication
effort. We are in the process of writing a book, making a documentary
and expanding our research.

The goal here is to give you some of the highlights of why the documents
are both interesting and genuine. The next level of intricate discussion
is provided on our CD ROM, The Secret: Evidence
We Are Not Alone.

Introduction to the Majestic Documents Authentication Problem

�Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof. Where is the evidence?� That
quotation from Carl Sagan captures the essence of skepticism by scientists
today, and they're looking for more proof than they can get from fuzzy
photographs and from testimony based on distant memories. What we have
here is the evidence. We have scores of documents, hundreds of thousands
of words, hundreds of pages, of which most are top secret code word. Not
just photocopies, but originals with real inks, watermarks and testable
paper. The vast majority has never been seen before.

We present here the detailed documentation that seems to place the stamp
of reality upon the recovery of crashed extraterrestrial vehicles by the
United States from 1947�1954. This validates what most people already
accept: there is extraterrestrial life and we are not alone. This presentation
by Dr. Robert M. and Ryan S. Wood follows chronologically a paper evidence
trail left by former Presidents, military and intelligence leaders of
the time. It tells what they did to keep the alien artifacts from our
enemies, to learn the secrets of alien technology, and to advance science.
While many might say that today's secrecy is unethical, evil and unconstitutional
it can be cogently argued that the original men were patriots not only
for our country, but also for all mankind by reducing the risk of nuclear
war. However, equally powerful arguments build the case that the leaders
are criminals for abrogating the Constitution and for denying the entire
planet of significant advances in standard of living and quality of life
for the least 30 years.

Research on the authenticity of this rich set of documents is a continuing
process, and equally important is the search for witnesses willing to
share their first hand experience and to confirm the accuracy of the documentation.

The authentication effort is multifaceted, including experts in military
history, intelligence, forensics, archival research and investigation.
The two primary investigators, Robert M. Wood and Ryan S. Wood are a father-son
team who have been exploring beyond the fringes of truth about the documentation
of crashed alien vehicles. Their focus is demonstrable proof, documents,
witnesses and courtroom quality evidence. They have worked hard in ufology
to get where they are today. It was their ability to build trust with
one of the most well-known UFO researchers, Stanton T. Friedman, that
won the confidence of Timothy Cooper to share his deep-throat papers reportedly
obtained from the mysterious former intelligence agent Cantwheel, one
of the key sources of the Majestic documents as discussed in the Sources
section of this website.

Critic's Arguments are Often Speculative

On the issue of authenticity, we'd also like to note that in ufology there
has been a lot of friction and animosity and people jumping up and saying
�Well, you can't prove it's real because...,� and this �might have been,�
or it �should have been,� or it �could have been...� What we like to do
is to deal with facts and specifics, not generalities. You'll see this
theme as we proceed. But we admit that authenticity is never certain,
even with an original. If you can't date the paper, you can't ever say
for sure that it's authentic. And we don't have original documents yet.
But, the kind of question you have to ask is how do you tell the difference
between the real and the fake? This is where Bob's experience and background
come into play. During the 1970s, his job at McDonnell Douglas was to
design radar algorithms that would help recognize the difference between
a large re-entry vehicle containing a nuclear weapon and a small decoy
designed to fool the radar. He developed several successful discriminants
that, when applied, yielded statistically significant accuracy in distinguishing
between true RVs and decoys. It is these same techniques that we're trying
to use in principle here to tell the difference between fake documents
and genuine documents. There is no a priori reason to favor one over the
other before applying some logical tests. The net result should be something
that you could take to a courtroom and say something like, �The probability
is ten to the minus four that these documents are not genuine.�

Document Discrimination

The criteria that we use are quite specific, and there are five. First, is
anything we know about the original � whatever that is, even if it's a
roll of film, it is the original for us, even though it might have come
from some earlier original. Second, you look at the typography, namely
the type, the style, the paper, the insignia and the chirography and evaluate
the handwriting and signatures. Third, look for things that are out of
place chronologically. Fourth, check the content and its links and consistency
with other classified documents and between documents in the outside world.
And fifth, then look at provenance � provenance of course dealing with
the origination of the documents and the chain of ownership that has occurred.
Now, our weakest link is the provenance because we can't prove that Timothy
Cooper got these documents out of his mailbox the way he says he did.
Overall, there are some things we call �zingers,� and this is something
we'll discuss later. An example is the raised �z� in one of the documents.
A �zinger� is one argument so impressive that � all alone � it says the
document is authentic.